The next day.
8 AM.
Shin arrived near the Hokage Building right on time.
“Shin, over here!” Before he could even get close, Abero spotted him and waved frantically.
Ito Miyuki stood beside him with her arms crossed.
As Shin approached, she glanced at him.
“You’re always the last one to arrive.” Shin didn’t care.
“Coming early doesn’t make a difference.
Teacher Nakagawa is always half an hour late anyway.
I might as well use that time to train for another hour at home.
Besides, I didn’t arrive late, did I?” “Shin, you still train in the morning?” Abero asked with a grin.
“I train for an hour every day after I wake up.” Ito Miyuki glanced at Shin, then muttered under her breath, “This guy is already this strong, yet he still works so hard.
From now on, one hour of cultivation needs to become two.” Their current strength hadn’t come from fooling around.
Every bit of it had been hammered out through relentless training.
Laziness would never make a Ninja strong.
Shin touched his nose, feeling slightly awkward.
He always woke up after seven.
Where would he get an extra hour for training?
He had only made up an excuse, yet the two of them had actually believed him.
Sure enough, at 8:30, Nakagawa Ichiryū finally appeared in front of the three.
“Teacher Nakagawa, you’re always late.
Why don’t we just change the meeting time to 8:30 next time?
You’re wasting my cultivation time.” Abero complained without holding anything back.
Nakagawa Ichiryū smiled awkwardly.
“Sorry.
I was helping an old lady cross the street, so I got delayed.” The three nearly collapsed.
The same excuse again.
Couldn’t he at least come up with something new?
“Alright.” Nakagawa Ichiryū clapped his hands.
“Everyone’s here.
Let’s go inside and accept a mission.” The four entered the hall and walked toward a row of wooden counters arranged in a circle.
Several Chunin sat behind them, both men and women, handling mission applications and issuing assignments.
As they walked, Abero started complaining again.
“Teacher Nakagawa, we’re not getting another mission to pick up trash, babysit, or pull weeds, are we?
I’m sick of those jobs.
Can’t we take something harder?” “Alright.” Nakagawa Ichiryū nodded.
“As you wish.
Today, we’ll take a C-rank mission.” “Really?” Abero jumped up, his face lighting up.
Finally, he wouldn’t have to babysit some noisy little brat again.
He’d developed a genuine fear of those missions.
Looking after children wasn’t easy at all.
Last time, he’d spent the entire day singing, dancing, and making ridiculous faces just to keep a child entertained.
By the time the mission ended, he was exhausted for three straight days.
C-rank missions were completely different.
D-rank missions generally involved no combat at all.
They existed mainly to let newly graduated Genin get used to completing missions and following orders.
Once a mission reached C-rank, combat could no longer be ruled out.
They usually wouldn’t encounter enemy Ninja, but bandits, thugs, robbers, and mountain brigands were common targets.
At least this time, things wouldn’t be quite so peaceful.
Of course, this was exactly what the three of them had been hoping for.
Doing nothing but daily-life missions for half a month would make anyone sick of them.
Shin was no exception.
He wanted to temper himself through actual combat, and using those scum who preyed on civilians as practice targets was ideal.
At the same time, another thought crossed his mind.
According to the regulations, a Genin had to complete fifteen D-rank missions before qualifying for a C-rank mission.
Nakagawa Ichiryū had broken that rule today.
That meant it wouldn’t be long before this batch of Genin was sent to the battlefield.
“This is great!
We can finally leave the Village!” Abero hadn’t realized what this meant yet.
Even if he had, he probably wouldn’t have cared.
Shin and Ito Miyuki followed silently behind him.
Miyuki had probably figured it out as well.
At the counter, Nakagawa Ichiryū spoke with the staff for a while.
Not long after, he returned with a mission scroll.
Written across it were the words: Bandit Suppression Mission Content: A group of roughly one hundred mountain bandits has occupied Blackhead Mountain, seriously disrupting the mountain roads.
They must be eliminated as soon as possible.
Rank: C Requirement: Kill all bandits.
Reward: 50,000 Ryu.
Shin’s eyes narrowed as he read the mission.
His earlier guess was now almost certain.
A practical combat mission, and a bandit suppression mission at that.
The Village was throwing these newly graduated Genin into real combat and forcing them to get used to killing.
Abero, who had been cheerful moments ago, went quiet.
Over a hundred bandits.
The mission didn’t ask them to drive the bandits away.
It required every last one of them to be killed.
That meant the three of them were expected to slaughter more than a hundred people.
Even Ito Miyuki’s usual fiery expression changed.
They were still children barely ten years old.
Knowing how to kill was one thing.
Actually taking a life was another.
Even Shin felt a weight settle in his chest.
As a transmigrator, his mental fortitude was stronger than theirs, but he couldn’t simply shrug off the thought of killing more than a hundred people.
Yet this was a road they had to walk.
And their enemies were mountain bandits who preyed on travelers and civilians, committing every kind of atrocity.
Killing them could at least be called ridding the people of a threat.
Shin could only cling to that thought for now.
Seeing the three of them fall silent, Nakagawa Ichiryū finally spoke.
“The mission has already been accepted, so there’s no backing out now.
Sooner or later, you’ll have to take this step.” He looked at the three children.
“Go home and rest today.
Tomorrow morning, gather at the Village entrance at nine.
I hope none of you are late.” With that, Nakagawa Ichiryū turned and left, leaving those words behind.
“To become a true Ninja, killing is something you must face.
What you need to learn is how to adapt, how to endure what others cannot, and how to shoulder responsibilities others refuse to carry.
Only then can you become a qualified Ninja.” After saying this, Nakagawa Ichiryū formed a hand seal.
Whoosh!
His figure blurred and vanished from the mission hall, leaving the three children standing in silence.
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